Proinsias De Rossa | |
|---|---|
 De Rossa in 2014 | |
| Minister for Social Welfare | |
| In office 15 December 1994 – 26 June 1997 | |
| Taoiseach | John Bruton |
| Preceded by | Michael Woods |
| Succeeded by | Dermot Ahern |
| Leader of Democratic Left | |
| In office 15 February 1992 – 11 July 1999 | |
| Preceded by | New office |
| Succeeded by | Office abolished |
| Leader of the Workers' Party | |
| In office 11 February 1988 – 8 February 1992 | |
| Preceded by | Tomás Mac Giolla |
| Succeeded by | Marian Donnelly |
| Member of the European Parliament | |
| In office 1 July 1999 – 22 February 2012 | |
| In office 1 July 1989 – 30 November 1992 | |
| Constituency | Dublin |
| Teachta Dála | |
| In office February 1982 – May 2002 | |
| Constituency | Dublin North-West |
| Chair of theEuropean Parliament Delegation for relations with Palestine | |
| In office 16 September 2009 – 1 February 2012 | |
| Preceded by | Kyriacos Triantaphyllides |
| Succeeded by | Martina Anderson |
| Personal details | |
| Born | Francis Ross (1940-05-15)15 May 1940 (age 85) |
| Political party | Labour Party(since 1999) |
| Other political affiliations |
|
| Alma mater | Dublin Institute of Technology |
Proinsias De Rossa (born 15 May 1940) is an Irish formerLabour Party politician who served asMinister for Social Welfare from 1994 to 1997,leader of Democratic Left from 1992 to 1999 andleader of the Workers' Party from 1988 to 1992. He served asMember of the European Parliament (MEP) for theDublin constituency from 1989 to 1992 and 1999 to 2012. He was aTeachta Dála (TD) forDublin North-West from 1982 to 2002.[1]
Born asFrancis Ross in 1940 inDublin, he was educated at Marlborough Street National School andDublin Institute of Technology. He joinedFianna Éireann at age 12.[2]
In May 1956, soon after his sixteenth birthday, he joined theIrish Republican Army (IRA),[3] and was politically active inSinn Féin from an early age. During theIRA border campaign, he was arrested while training other IRA members inGlencree in May 1957. He served seven months inMountjoy Prison and was then interned at theCurragh Camp.[4]
He took the Official Sinn Féin side in the 1970 split. In 1977, he contested his firstgeneral election for the party, which that year was renamed Sinn Féin The Workers' Party (in 1982 the name changed again to theWorkers' Party).
He was successful on his third attempt, and was elected at theFebruary 1982 general election as a Sinn Féin The Workers' PartyTD for theDublin North-West constituency. He retained his seat until the2002 general election when he stood down in order to devote more time to his work in theEuropean Parliament.
In 1988, De Rossa succeededTomás Mac Giolla as president of the Workers' Party. The party had been growing steadily in the 1980s, and had its best-ever electoral performance in thegeneral andEuropean elections held in 1989. The party won 7 Dáil seats with 5% of the vote. De Rossa himself was elected to the European Parliament for theDublin constituency, where he topped the poll and the party almost succeeded in replacingFine Gael as the capital's second-largest party. He sat as a member of theGroup for the European United Left. However, the campaign resulted in a serious build-up of financial debt by the Workers' Party, which threatened to greatly inhibit the party's ability to ensure it would hold on to its gains.
Long-standing tensions within the Workers' Party, pitting reformers, including most of the party's TDs, against hard-liners centred on former general secretarySeán Garland, came to a head in 1992. Disagreements on policy issues were exacerbated by the desire of the reformers to ditch thedemocratic centralist nature of the party structures, and to remove any remaining questions about alleged party links with theOfficial IRA, a topic which had been the subject of persistent and embarrassing media coverage. De Rossa called a SpecialArdfheis (party conference) to debate changes to the constitution. The motion failed to get the required two-thirds majority, and subsequently De Rossa led the majority of the parliamentary group and councillors out of a meeting of the party's Central Executive Committee the following Saturday at Wynn's Hotel, splitting the party.
De Rossa and the other former Workers' Party members then established a new political party, provisionally called New Agenda. At its founding conference in March 1992, it was namedDemocratic Left and De Rossa was elected party leader. Later that year he resigned his European Parliament seat, where he was succeeded by Democratic Left general secretaryDes Geraghty.
Following the collapse of theFianna Fáil–Labour Party coalition government in 1994, Fine Gael, Labour and Democratic Left negotiated a government programme for the remaining life of the 27th Dáil, which became known as theRainbow Coalition. De Rossa becameMinister for Social Welfare. He initiated Ireland's first national anti-poverty strategy, a commission on the family, and a commission to examine national pension policy.
Also under De Rossa, taxes on unemployment benefits were abolished, while the level of unemployment assistance for those living in the family home was increased substantially.[5] A One Parent Family Allowance was also introduced, along with a Disability Allowance, Adoptive Benefit, Health and Safety Benefit and Survivor's Pension.[6]
The1997 general election resulted in the defeat of the outgoing coalition. At this point, Democratic Left had accumulated a very significant financial debt. In light of the co-operation achieved in practically all policy areas during the Rainbow Coalition, the party decided to merge with the Labour Party. Labour leaderRuairi Quinn continued as leader of the unified party; De Rossa took up the symbolic post of party president, which he held until 2002.
In 1999, De Rossa was elected again at theEuropean Parliament election for the Dublin constituency, sitting on this occasion with theGroup of the Party of European Socialists. De Rossa did not contest hisDáil seat at the2002 general election.[7] He was re-elected at the2004 European Parliament election. As a member of the European Parliament, De Rossa took a strong pro-integration approach from a distinctlysocial democratic perspective, as well as a keen interest in foreign policy and social policy.
De Rossa was a member of theEuropean Convention which produced the July 2003 draftEuropean Constitution. De Rossa was chair of theEuropean Parliament's delegation for relations with the Palestinian Legislative Council. He was a member of theCommittee on Employment and Social Affairs and the Conference of Delegation Chairs, and a substitute member of theCommittee on Development and the delegation to theEuro-Mediterranean Parliamentary Assembly. On 16 January 2012, he announced his decision to resign as an MEP,[8] and stepped down on 1 February.
| Elections to theDáil | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Party | Election | FPv | FPv% | Result | ||
| Sinn Féin The Workers' Party | Dublin Finglas | 1977 | 1,317 | 4.8 | Eliminated on count 3/8 | |
| Dublin North-West | 1981 | 2,071 | 6.4 | Eliminated on count 8/11 | ||
| Dublin North-West | February 1982 | 3,906 | 12.4 | Elected on count 9/9 | ||
| Workers' Party | Dublin North-West | November 1982 | 6,291 | 19.8 | Elected on count 4/10 | |
| Dublin North-West | 1987 | 6,866 | 19.8 | Elected on count 5/13 | ||
| Dublin North-West | 1989 | 7,976 | 26.7 | Elected on count 1/9 | ||
| Democratic Left | Dublin North-West | 1992 | 4,562 | 12.2 | Elected on count 12/12 | |
| Dublin North-West | 1997 | 3,701 | 10.1 | Elected on count 10/10 | ||
| Elections to theEuropean Parliament | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Party | Election | FPv | FPv% | Result | ||
| Workers' Party | Dublin | 1989 | 71,041 | 15.8 | Elected on count 6/6 | |
| Labour | Dublin | 1999 | 28,748 | 10.2 | Elected on count 8/8 | |
| Dublin | 2004 | 54,344 | 12.9 | Elected on count 6/6 | ||
| Dublin | 2009 | 83,471 | 20.5 | Elected on count 6/7 | ||
During De Rossa's period as leader of Democratic Left, Irish journalistEamon Dunphy, writing in theSunday Independent newspaper, published an article alleging that De Rossa was aware, while a member of the Workers' Party, of the Official IRA's alleged illegal activities, including bank robberies and forgery. De Rossa sued the newspaper forlibel and was awarded IR£300,000.[9]
| Political offices | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by | Minister for Social Welfare 1994–1997 | Succeeded byas Minister for Social, Community and Family Affairs |
| Party political offices | ||
| Preceded by | President of the Workers' Party 1988–1992 | Succeeded by |
| New political party | Leader of Democratic Left 1992–1999 | Succeeded by Merged withLabour Party |
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